Black Magic Fire
by Hades'Queen
Summary: Dustfinger has finally returned, but nothing is the same and Meggie’s absence hurts him. Not to mention everyone seems to have turned against him after his confession. Meanwhile, Meggie is living her own hell.


**Disclaimer: **Everything belongs to Cornelia Funke, and the song that inspired this dark little fic is by My Chemical Romance and is called "This Is How I Disappear."

**Authors Note: **Story takes place after the conclusion of Inkdawn (which we are still anxiously awaiting for), Dustfinger has found his way back, but Meggie has disappeared. This story is a little darker than the other's that I have written and perhaps you might not like it. So Meggie would be about fifteen.

**Summary: **Dustfinger has finally returned, but nothing is the same and Meggie's absence hurts him. Not to mention everyone seems to have turned against him after his confession. Meanwhile, Meggie is living her own hell.

**Black Magic Fire**

_To un-explain  
The unforgivable  
Drain all the blood and give the kids a show_

Dustfinger flinched at the sight of the fury in Roxane's eyes after he accidentally blurted out how he felt for Meggie, after hearing everything that had happened in his absence. Roxane's relief to have him back quickly melted into rage as she stared at him. Dustfinger consciously turned to see Briana and Farid who were staring with their mouths open, the very same way that kids would when he would perform his fire tricks.

"You may see this as unforgivable and repulsive, but I owe you no explanations, not to any of you," he said as he stared into Roxane's eyes and cast a glance around the room. He stared into Roxane's eyes. "You remarried while I was gone. I understand why and I am not reprimanding you for it, but I deserved the right to fall in love as well," he said as he turned to look at Farid. "I gave up my life, to just make her happy by having you back, but look at what you have done. You've fallen in love with my daughter, who has loathed me, with good reason for my whole life."

"You are the most selfish man I have ever met!" Roxane said as she launched herself at Dusfinger and wrapped her raw fingers around his neck; raw after a long days work. Dustfinger gasped, unable to breath and turned to look at the two shocked teenagers that were sitting back and enjoying the show. Dusfinger grabbed Roxane's hands and forced them away, a slightly difficult task, but one that he could manage.

"This isn't a show, get going," Dustfinger snapped as he stared at the two kids who immediately got up and scuttled away.

_By streetlight, this dark night  
__A séance down below_

Meggie stumbled along the street, after crawling out from a gutter and crawled beneath the streetlight and sat down on the concrete floor, resting against the laps post. Meggie closed her eyes, her heart was beating at a rapid pace as she reached up a dirty, grimy little hand to the corner of her mouth were bloody was slipping out. Momentarily, she cast a glance around and spotted not to far from where she sat the entrance to Madame Vladsivodka's psychic shop, where beneath the street there was some sort of ritual happening. She closed her eyes and leaned against the lamppost thinking about the mysterious way in which she appeared in this twisted story.

Unfortunately and by some twist of the cosmos, Orpheus, whom she'd always regarded as a lowly creature, was as low as the sick and twisted as some of the books he read, which was the reason why she was there. He'd been ignorantly reading aloud to himself, and something came out from the book at the precise moment she had stepped in the room. The next thing she knew she was being sold into slavery.

Now, she was nothing but property, and for the past couple of months, she'd been forced to do things that had completely eroded away at her soul, so that there was nothing left inside her heart. It seemed that here and now, is some small country in Europe where she didn't understand the language or anything else that she was the property of Madame Vladsivodka, who dealt in child prostitution.

_There're things that I have done  
__You never  
__Should ever know_

The life she had known, the family and people that she loved, including the world that she loved, seemed to steadily be fading from all my memory. It even felt that everything that she had lived before she appeared in this dreadful nightmare was nothing but a dream which she'd been rudely awakened from. The only thing that convinced her that it was real, was the fact that she felt a terrible pain to remember them for she missed them so. But even now, lying beneath the light of the damned, she thought that the reason that she was in pain from remembering those people and that place was not because it was real, but because it wasn't real. Because it was truly nothing more than a dream and that her life was truly something so horrid that she wanted to escape from it by trying to convince herself that she had been something better than a prostitute.

Day by day, the "dreams" were fading as she started to strive for her own survival. She wasn't sure why she was striving to survive, but in her dreams she could see a scared face so clearly, that it made her hear beat and made her strive to live. Perhaps that was the reason that she did all the horrible things that she did, simply so that she wouldn't be killed by Madame Vladsivodka for not doing what she was supposed to do. She strove to live, in the hopes that she would one day find that man in her dreams and that he would save her from the hell that she was living.

Meggie laughed aloud to herself as she got herself to her feet and remembered that no one would ever love her for what she was and neither did she want the man that she was in love with to know what she was. Meggie he slowly stumbled to Madame Vladsivodka's hovel of a shop, which was truly just the cover up for her whore house.

In her early days, she remembered trying so many times to run away, but it was always so pointless. She was lost in a country where she didn't understand the language and couldn't do anything for herself. She had no way of getting around or finding someplace of any use to get her where she needed to be. There was no one that she could run to and explain her tragic story and even if she could, they would simply think that she was crazy.

_And without you is how I disappear  
__And live my life alone  
__Forever now  
__And without you is how I disappear  
__And live my life alone  
__Forever now  
__Who walks among the famous living dead _

Dustfinger was lying on the grass and staring up at the fairies in the trees, the nights' moon hidden behind clouds. He sighed as he stared at what his life had become. He'd quickly become loathed by all, for loving Meggie, like it was such a great Crime. Well perhaps it was in the world that they came from, but in the Inkworld, as Meggie always liked to call it, it was perfectly normal if a girl of thirteen were already betrothed and it wasn't strange to see a girl about the age of fifteen to marry a man in his thirties.

However, what truly bothered him was not the fact that he was loathed by everyone, because the truth was that he couldn't really care any less about that. But he severely missed Meggie, more than anything in the world. He'd struggled for a year, so hard to get back, not to Roxane, but to Meggie. However, she was gone, and it seemed that he was doomed to live the rest of his live, alone.

Dustfinger sighed as he came to realized that it really didn't make any difference. Without Meggie, his life was worth nothing and if his life was worth nothing, than he was worth nothing. There was no point in remaining in the Inkworld. There was nothing there for him, not even his animated fire. That passion had extinguished the very moment that Meggie's disappeared.

Dustfinger laughed as he realized that he was the walking, living dead, however, the one person that mattered to him, was not walking among the living. At least not in their world, she was gone and lost to them; Perhaps, never to return again.

_Drowns all the boys and girls inside your bed  
__And if you could talk to me  
__Tell me if it's so  
__That all the good girls go  
__To heaven  
__Well heaven knows_

Meggie lay on the ground, drowning in her own depression, just like all the other girls and boys that at some point had been abducted and sold to Madame Vladsivodka, who sold them to those depraved souls who wanted their pleasures and desires fed. There were girls and boy ranging fro the young age of seven, to the ages of seventeen.

Meggie turned on her back and stared across at the wall opposite of her where the small window with iron bars across it, cast the blue light of the moon onto a crucifix and Meggie felt something in her stomach revolt as she thought of the hypocrisy of it. However, staring at the man that was nailed to the cross, she thought about what she'd read and thought about what happened to you if you were good in your life, you went to heaven in the end.

Meggie felt a tear slip from her eye, down the side of her face and land in her golden hair. If she were to die, in the hands of one of Madame Vladsivodka's clients, would god, if he existed, have the mercy to accept her into heaven? She was already living in hell, and she couldn't picture that anything else could possibly be worse, however, she wondered if her wretched life, would lead her to hell or wondered if she had already died and landed in hell.

She sighed, wiping the tear from her eye, knowing that only heaven knew. However, she prayed that mercy be shown upon her and that she would soon be saved from the inferno she had been so carelessly tossed in.

_And without you is how I disappear  
__And live my life alone  
__Forever now  
__And without you is how I disappear  
__And live my life alone  
__Forever now_

When Meggie awoke the following afternoon, to begin the regular routine, she got dressed and ready for another day of vices and made her way towards the back of the building, where the brothel lay. Running a hand through her hair, making her way, she could almost see his face, but it slipped away as she was roughly grabbed by the hair and tossed into the brothel, she was taking far too long.

Meggie felt a tear slip from her eye, wondering why she was continuing to live for. The man in her dreams was not there, he was somewhere very far away that she could not recall. She was living for nothing. What was the point in continuing?

_Can you hear me cry out to you?  
__Words I thought I'd choke on  
__Figure out  
__I'm not so without you anymore  
__I'm just a ghost_

Dustfinger fell on his knees, crying out Meggie's name and his vow of love if she would only return to him from wherever she was, but nothing. There was simply nothing. Except that strange sound of snapping twigs as someone was walking toward him. Dustfinger twirled around and looked at the man coming out and was disappointed that it was just Orpheus, walking along with a light skinned girl that seemed to be about seventeen with a gorgeous face.

Orpheus jumped at the sight of what seemed to be Dustfinger's ghost. "What's wrong with you?" Dustfinger asked as he stared at the man who'd gone so suddenly pale.

"You, you died!" the man muttered.

"Yes, and I returned," Dustfinger said as he stared at Orpheus, wondering how it was that he'd never found out of it. "Who is she?" Dustfinger asked with a furrowed brow as he stared at the pompous man, wondering what he was doing with such a beautiful girl.

"Read her out of a story," said the man arrogantly, inflating with dignity and pride.

"When?" Dustfinger asked with a raised brow and a look of disgust as he stared at Orpheus. He'd always hated how the man read things and people out of their stories like it was just a game to him.

"Actually, come to think of it, it was around the same time that girl disappeared," he said as he shrugged like it was something unimportant.

"Meggie?" he asked as he stared at Orpheus, and thinking about what Farid had told him about the day Meggie disappeared. She'd been on her way to visit Orpheus, because she wanted to tell him that he had to stop reading things out of books because things from the Inkworld kept disappearing.

"Was that her name?" Orpheus asked, though it was evident that he didn't care whether it was her name or it wasn't

"Where, where did you read her out of?" Dustfinger asked.

_So I can't hurt you anymore_

"Here have you been, I've been so worried?" Roxane said as she rushed toward Dustfinger as he appeared on her doorway. Dustfinger stood stiffly as he felt her arms around him, which caused her to pull away as she looked at him with a furrowed gaze, already sensing that there was something wrong. "What's wrong?" she asked, looking as his pale face.

"I'm leaving."

"Why?" Roxane cried out

"_So I can't hurt you anymore."_

_And now  
__You want to see how far down I can sink?  
__Well let me go!_

Meggie walked very slowly to the table where Madame Valdsivodka had pointed her out to a man who, by her hand signals, had apparently had paid a lot of money for her company. Meggie sat down next to the man that was covered in from head to foot by a heavy black cloak and had his face hidden beneath a hood, from which she could only see his mouth and chin. But she didn't care. If she didn't have to see his face, it was all the better; It was one face less that she would have to face in her nightmares when she relieved every horrid caress.

"How does such an angel sink so low?" he asked as she picked up his cup of liquor and drank it to numb the pain. She'd already had a few drinks, and everything was becoming mildly blurry and her brain could hardly make sense of much. All she knew was that, though she was completely inhibited, she still maintained her motor skills.

"You've seen nothing yet," she said as she laid her hand on his cheek and caressed it. The man caught her hand and pulled it away from him. "I can't show you how low I can sink if you hold onto me," she said as she stared at him, though, there wasn't much to stare at.

_So- you can- well now so- you can  
__I'm so far away from you  
__Well now so- you can_

"Are you all right?" he asked as he stared at her, she'd just gotten a small dizzy spell in the face of her dreams seemed to spin before her. Meggie shook her head and looked up, thinking that dreams belonged nowhere in the pit of hell.

"Do you think that a prostitute is ever all right?" Meggie asked as she raised her head. "When you can die any day which to tell the truth would be a welcome relief from the constant rape and beatings."

"What would you give to be saved?" he asked as he stared at her.

"I cannot be saved, there would be no point to it, I'm already dead," Meggie responded, staring at the bottom of the glass. "What about you, how do you fall so low?"

"I came… to save the girl that I love, even if she does not love me in return," he said, lowering his hood.

_And without you is how I disappear  
__And without you is how I disappear_

Meggie turned around and felt herself sober immediately as she stared at the scarred face and wondered if perhaps she had taken one too many. "I… remember you," Meggie said as she stared into his eyes and felt tears rising in her own. "But they were just dreams, you can't be real, you can't truly be here."

"I am."

"How?" she said as she looked at him.

"Orpheus read you into another girls story and now, he has read me into the story of the Englishman, who was in love with the girl that you replaced, and saves her. So here I am, in his stead, saving you," Dustfinger said as he stared into Meggie's eyes and saw a light jump into them and felt the tears rushing down her face.

"It wasn't a dream! Orpheus read me here! And… Mo… Resa, they must have been so worried," Meggie said as she stared into Dustfinger's eyes and suddenly realized what he'd been saying to her, when he'd been the mysterious figure beneath the hood. "The girl that you love?"

"Yes, Meggie, I'm in love with you. But that's not important. I simply came to save you, not for your love, I don't expect anything from you," Dustfinger said as he stared at her. Meggie felt her tears sprinting down her face as she threw her arms around him.

"Oh Dustfinger! I have dreamt of you every night, hoping that you would save me and here you are!" she said as she cried into his shoulder. Dustfinger shut his eyes and held the girl in his arms as she cried and buried his head in her hair. "I love you, Dustfinger."

_Forever  
__Forever now_

_**THE END**_

**A/N:** Please leave a review. Hoped you all liked the happy ending and didn't think that the story was too, horribly dark.


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